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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27127780">My Soul Will Find Yours</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/cardinalgirl75/pseuds/cardinalgirl75'>cardinalgirl75</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Across Two Lifetimes [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>A Song of Ice and Fire &amp; Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/M, Jaime's will follow, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, and there's some exploration of past lives, but i promise there's a happy ending, there's a lot of angst, this is Brienne's story, yes I went there, yes they're soulmates</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 19:13:53</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>14,437</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27127780</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/cardinalgirl75/pseuds/cardinalgirl75</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Brienne Tarth always knew she had a soulmate.  Even before she understood completely what a soulmate was or how unlikely the rest of the world would think it that she had one, she knew he was somewhere out there because she dreamed about him all the time.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Across Two Lifetimes [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1980070</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>81</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>185</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter One</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Hi, there!  I've been tinkering with this story since...May, I think?  I got distracted by my fic exchange and then took a break after the writing frenzy I went into getting it finished by the deadline, but once I was ready, I came back to this one.  The story is complete, and I'll post new parts every couple of days or so.  My eternal thanks go to waxedpaperdoor for her beta skills and support for this story!</p><p>I hope you enjoy!  Kudos and comments are always welcome!!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Once, soulmates were a rare thing.  Only those blessed by the gods received a mark assuring them that somewhere in the world, there was someone destined for them.  However, as time went on, the gods watched the miseries of the world.  Plagues that killed thousands of people in mere months.  Long, bitter winters that killed tens of thousands.  Wars that killed more than those two combined.  People began fearing happiness, for happiness could be taken away in an instant, leaving behind nothing but grief and despair.  Better to never have it than to risk losing it.</p>
<p>The Mother and the Maiden wept for the people’s suffering.  The Warrior and the Father despaired that the ones left behind were so defenseless that soon there would be nothing left.  The Crone, the Smith, and the Stranger were pragmatic, but always, always in the back of the gods’ collective consciousness was the knowledge that there would one day be another threat to humanity, the greatest threat of all.  If humanity was to survive, the people had to believe there was a reason to live.</p>
<p>What greater reason was there than true love?</p>
<p>More people began seeing marks upon their bodies, though not all.  The hope that was dying within them rekindled when they appeared.  Although the world still suffered tragedies, people found the strength to rebuild and remain hopeful.  Heroes were made of ordinary people who did nothing more than love each other in defiance of the odds against them, stories passed down through the generations to provide inspiration even in the darkest hours.</p>
<p>And humanity survived.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>~*~*~*~*~*</p>
</div>Brienne Tarth always knew she had a soulmate.  Even before she understood completely what a soulmate was or how unlikely the rest of the world would think it that she had one, she knew he was somewhere out there because she dreamed about him all the time.<p>When she dreamed of him as a young child growing up on Tarth, she thought him nothing more than an imaginary friend.  She thought her dreams were great adventures and she did her best to reenact the things she saw in her mind.  A long stick and a trash can lid became her sword and shield with which she had to defend her family and her dear friend, who back then she called Golden Lion because the armor he wore in her dreams always had gold lions on it.  And because even though he called her by her name sometimes—when he wasn’t calling her wench—she didn’t know what his name was. </p>
<p>When her older brother Galladon teased her, saying that only boys played with swords and that the boys would have to defend her, she whacked him with the trash can lid and got spanked as a result.  In her bed that night, with a smarting bottom and no dinner, Brienne whispered her stories to her dolls.  She didn’t let her brother’s teasing get to her.  She kept dreaming up her stories of a young, intrepid girl who trained to be a knight because she could never be the lady everyone thought she should be.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>~*~*~*~*~*</p>
</div><i>“I thought I warned you about grimacing when you lunge, wench,” Golden Lion said as they circled around each other.  “All these years later, and still you have not changed.”</i><p>
  <i>Brienne snorted.  “Somehow I doubt that wights, White Walkers, and whatever else is coming for us is going to notice my facial expressions.  They’ll be too busy trying to bite my face off.”  Still, she did her best not to give away her move as she lunged forward.  He met her.  If his moves were not as graceful as they had once been when he’d had his sword hand, he had developed enough competency to be a decent sparring partner.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>Swords clashed together and broke apart as the two of them engaged in the familiar dance.  Neither noticed the small crowd that had gathered to watch them, as this had become a common occurrence since their arrival at Winterfell.  Brienne wondered who they came to stare at.  Was it her, because she was a woman wielding a sword?  Or him, because of his reputation?  She didn’t care.  When she was battling against Golden Lion, the rest of the world fell away and it was just them, the clashing of swords, and the determination she always felt to prove herself to him.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>She had told him that once.  He laughed and said, “Why?  You’ve more than proven how good you are with a sword.  You defeated me when I had both my hands.”  His laughter faded.  “My last fight when I had both.”</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“I would not have, were you at full strength,” she admitted.  “I almost didn’t.  And now we’re about to face things that are stronger than the Hound.  Thousands of them.  Tens of thousands, even.”</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“You can’t think that way,” Golden Lion said.  “We have to believe that the living will prevail.  We have to believe that we will survive.  If you do not, all is lost before the battle is begun.”</i>
</p>
<p><i>Brienne remembered that now, as she worked on not grimacing when she lunged, and when she tried something new to throw Golden Lion off so he didn’t fall into familiar patterns, and he did the same for her.</i>  The living must prevail.  We will survive.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>~*~*~*~*~*</p>
</div>General wisdom used to say that souls only lived one lifetime and therefore had only one opportunity to find their soulmate in the lifetime they were given.  Soulmates were a gift from the gods in the first place, so why would they favor some souls over others and give them more than one chance to be together?  It was hardly fair, especially to those who never got a soulmate at all.<br/>However, during difficult periods in human history, many soulmates were unable to find each other in the lifetime they were given.  The gods did not control everything, try though they might.  When more and more of those lost souls died, mourning the ones they had never met, regretting the lives they’d lived or never had the chance to live, the gods took pity on them, returning them to another time for a second chance.  Most had no memory of having lived a previous life, although many noted that they felt an odd sort of psychic ache that lifted when finally united with their soulmate.<p>On rare occasions, however, a person did remember their previous life.  At first, when they told their stories, people did not believe them and thought they were mad.  One enterprising young woman insisted on having a likeness drawn of her soulmate, whom she met four years later.  People stopped believing her mad but believed her to have greensight.  Others, hearing her story, started doing the same for fear of what people would say if they talked of their soulmates in any other terms.</p>
<p>Then an earnest young man, who had gone to the Citadel after learning his soulmate had died in a riding accident before they had the chance to be united, began to listen to the stories.  He recorded them in journals and discovered that every story had one thing in common.  All of them reported meeting their soulmate in the past, only to be driven apart by circumstance.  They were betrothed at a young age, then one of them died before a marriage took place.  One was married off to someone else even after the soulmark appeared.  They had been sworn enemies who hadn’t realized they were soulmates.</p>
<p>As the young man put together a record of these stories, people’s opinions finally changed for good, and it was accepted that there was a small percentage of people who had lived before, and remembered their soulmates in those lives.</p>
<p>Brienne first suspected she was dreaming of her soulmate when she was about eight years old.  When she first read about the phenomenon of soulmates in past lives, she didn’t dare believe that she was one of them.  She did some research and found that people who had past soulmates were often descended from the First Men, which she definitely wasn’t—and she’d done the digging into her family tree to be sure.  Yet the more she read, and the more she dreamed about the same tall, golden-haired man with the sharp smile and brilliant green eyes, the more she became convinced that he’d been her soulmate.</p>
<p>She wasn’t sure how she felt about that, because just as she acknowledged who he had to be, she started liking him less.  In her dreams, he mocked her for her looks, for liking someone who didn’t know she existed, for being naïve.  When he called her “wench,” it didn’t sound like a term of affection like it had when she was younger.  In exchange, she had taken to calling him Kingslayer, though she didn’t know why.</p>
<p>He certainly never acted in a way that confirmed they were soulmates.  But something about him called to her, even when he was at his worst.  Brienne sometimes wished she could dream about a nice, safe boy, or wished that Kingslayer would go back to being the wonderful person she’d first come to know.  It was tough to know that at some point in their past history, she had been as much an object of ridicule to him as she was to everyone else in her present life. </p>
<p>At eight, Brienne was at least a head taller than all the boys at Evenfall Middle School.  If she’d any chance of being reasonably attractive, it was gone in the same boating accident that killed her mother and Galladon when she was six.  She was left with a nose broken in two places and a long scar that ran from just below her right eye to her chin.  Her father retreated into work and sometimes into the arms of other women, leaving Brienne in the company of a nanny who made sure that Brienne was aware of her lack of looks.</p>
<p>Brienne’s only consolation during this time was when she realized that in her present dreams of Kingslayer, he seemed younger.  He also had both of his hands, whereas in her early dreams his right hand was made of gold.  Much though it might pain her to have to remember their entire history in the past, Brienne figured the gods were giving her these memories for a reason.  Perhaps when she met him in the present, he would be as dismissive as he currently was in her dreams, and this was giving her the courage to persevere.</p>
<p>Brienne began keeping track of her dreams in a journal.  Because she still didn’t have a name for him, she identified him as Kingslayer.  She thought of calling herself by a different name, but instead she made sure to lock her journal in a small safe her father had given her on her last nameday to keep her valuables in.  He’d even placed the first item in it himself—a coral bracelet he’d bought her mother for their eleventh anniversary, which had been six months before she’d died.  She was grateful her father had given it to her.  She never knew when nasty old Nanny Roelle might decide to snoop.  She thought Brienne silly enough already. </p>
<p>“Quit wasting your time on daydreams,” Nanny Roelle snapped at her one night when she caught Brienne writing in her journal instead of doing her math homework.  “If you’re going to make anything of yourself, it’s going to have to be with your brain because the gods didn’t see fit to make you pretty enough to deserve a soulmate.”</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>~*~*~*~*~*</p>
</div><i>Brienne’s heart hurt to look at the women hanging from the tree.  “They Lay with Lions,” the sign hung around the neck of the one in the middle read, and a shiver went through her.  She knew the Stark men were looking for them, and they were not likely to believe her if she told them that she was doing what Lady Catelyn ordered.  If they were captured, was this also to be her fate?</i><p>
  <i>Brienne couldn’t let them continue to hang like that, to be a feast for the crows.  These women had done nothing more than what women had had to do for centuries to survive if they had no one to protect them.  She doubted they’d had a choice in the matter. She climbed the tree and began cutting them down, Kingslayer’s mocking and Cleos’s entreaties for them to get back on the river ignored.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>Brienne could not ignore the sight of the sail heading their way.  She jumped down from the tree and ordered Cleos and Kingslayer to hurry back to the skiff.  She gave Cleos an oar and ordered him to row, which he did, but not without a great deal of complaining.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>They were able to keep from sight for the better part of an hour, but she knew that they would ultimately be found.  Brienne’s mind raced to figure out how to avoid capture, doing her best to block out Kingslayer’s suggestion that they should try to take on their pursuers in hand-to-hand combat.  Had he been anyone other than who he was, she might have considered his offer and armed him.  She’d heard the stories throughout the Stark camp about how he’d cut down ten men trying to get to Robb Stark and end the war, and despite being in chains for a year, she suspected he would be formidable.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>She had no intention of finding out personally, though, because she knew if they survived such an attack that the next person he would come for was her.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>Brienne took in their location quickly, noticed a bluff ahead, and got an idea.  It would mean trusting Kingslayer and Cleos not to leave her behind, but if her plan failed, they were done for, anyway.  She ordered them to row and jumped out of the skiff, heading for the bluff.  Then came the difficult part.  She had to make her way up and pray that the archers’ aim was bad enough that she didn’t end up getting killed.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>Out of nowhere, Kingslayer started shouting at their pursuers, daring them to fight him one on one, almost as if he were…as if he were trying to distract them from her.  Giving thanks to whatever gods were listening, she scrambled the rest of the way up and went looking for the closest boulder she could find, hoping to find something that would give them a chance to make their escape and continue on to King’s Landing.</i>
</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>~*~*~*~*~*</p>
</div>By the time girls reached early adolescence, they had warmed to the idea that The One was out there waiting for them.  They began looking forward to the day they’d get their soulmark, speculating what it would look like and where it would be.  Boys were still resistant to soulmates but said that the soulmark was the only good thing about having one, because it was like a tattoo and tattoos were cool.<p>Brienne had never told anyone about her dreams of her soulmate for a couple of reasons.  The obvious one was that no one would believe her.  The other reason was that there was something about her experiences with Kingslayer that she wanted to keep to herself.  Even though they’d never met in this life, she felt like she shared a secret bond with him and if she told others, then that bond would fade away.  She had no idea if he felt the same way.  With her luck, he probably kept her existence a secret because he was ashamed of her.</p>
<p>But there was one person she thought might be safe to tell.</p>
<p>Brienne blushed whenever she thought of how cute Mr. Baratheon was, and how he was always so nice to her.  He was her English teacher, although as much as he talked about history, he could have taught either class.  He was especially fond of the War of the Five Kings, and she longed to share what she knew about that era with him.</p>
<p>Brienne wasn’t naïve.  She knew her crush on Mr. Baratheon was hopeless.  He was so much older than her, and soulmates tended to be close in age.  Even though no one had seen his soulmark, nor had he introduced anyone to a soulmate, he had to have one.  The gods wouldn’t be so cruel as to leave someone so handsome and charming without a soulmate.  And finally, he looked nothing like Kingslayer.</p>
<p>Ah, yes.  The cynical, sarcastic, maddening, Kingslaying soulmate who she sometimes wished she could strangle with his own chains.</p>
<p>What finally convinced her that she might be able to trust Mr. Baratheon was when she started dreaming of him.  He wore a crown in her dreams, which made sense to her because of how regal his bearing was today.  He honored her by making her a knight…no, not a knight.  Women couldn’t be knights back then, and he called her Lady Brienne.  But he gave her something more precious than a knighthood—he made her his protector.  Most of all, Brienne in the past was as affected by him as she was by his present counterpart.  Even though Kingslayer didn’t appear in these dreams, she understood that Mr. Baratheon was the person he had been teasing her about.</p>
<p>Brienne brought one of her journals to school with the intention of showing Mr. Baratheon her stories (as she’d taken to calling them).  She walked toward the teacher’s lounge during Mr. Baratheon’s free period, hoping to catch him alone.  She was so fixed on her destination that she didn’t notice the trio of boys until they were passing each other by.  She averted her gaze, praying they’d been too busy or distracted to notice her.  She should have known better.  This trio in particular gave her grief every opportunity they got.</p>
<p>Ron Connington, the ringleader of the group, spied her first.  He was several inches shorter than her but fast.  Before Brienne could hide the journal in her hand, he snatched it away and said, “What’s this, Beauty?  Your diary?”</p>
<p>Brienne’s stomach dropped.  “Give it back, Ron,” she said, realizing too late her mistake.</p>
<p>“Oooh, whatcha gonna do if I don’t?  Guys?”</p>
<p>Before Brienne could react, Ben Bushy and Eddie Ambrose grabbed her arms and pinned her up against the lockers.  Ron opened the notebook and leafed through it, coming to a stop somewhere near the back.</p>
<p>Then he started reading aloud to the small crowd that had gathered.  And of course, Ron had flipped to her more recent efforts which featured Mr. Baratheon (who she had daringly referred to by his first name of Renly).  Brienne struggled fiercely, but Ben and Eddie had her pinned in such a way that she couldn’t break free.  She could do nothing but try not to cry as everyone laughed at her.</p>
<p>“Seriously, Beauty?” Ron said, breathless with laughter.  “You think you stand a chance with Mr. Baratheon?  I’m sorry—<i>Renly?</i>  It wouldn’t matter if you were the prettiest woman in the world—which you <i>aren’t,</i> but even if you were—you’d never get him.  He’s too busy making eyes at Mr. Tyrell.”</p>
<p>“I’ll bet that’s not all he’s making with Mr. Tyrell,” Ben snickered.</p>
<p>“People like you don’t get soulmates, because the gods would never be that cruel to some poor guy,” Ron said.  He came up to her, grabbed her jaw hard enough to leave bruises, and forced her face up far enough to see him.  “They wouldn’t even by that cruel to a blind guy.  So the idea that you could be…” </p>
<p>“What’s going on here?” a loud voice called from the teacher’s lounge.  Brienne couldn’t look up because she knew that voice so well.  “Ron, Ben, Eddie, let Brienne go—now!”</p>
<p>Brienne was immediately freed.  All the strength had gone out of her legs and she slumped to the floor.  She wrapped her arms around her bent legs and rested her head on her knees, silent sobs racking her body.  She was in such misery that she didn’t hear Mr. Baratheon order the three boys to the principal’s office and tell the crowd around her to disperse.  She flinched when she felt Mr. Baratheon gently touch her shoulder.</p>
<p>“Brienne, hon?  I need you to get up.  Come on, that’s a good girl.”</p>
<p>Brienne managed to stand up on wobbly legs and walk to the teacher’s lounge with Mr. Baratheon’s help.  He sat her down and got her a glass of water.  As he handed it to her, the sleeve of his sweater rode up and she saw it.  It was a golden rose, clearly visible on his wrist.</p>
<p>She’d seen that mark before…on the wrist of the history teacher, Mr. Tyrell.</p>
<p>She didn’t remember much after that.  Mr. Baratheon called her father, who came to pick her up from school.  Despite Nanny Roelle’s warnings, her father let her stay home for the next week, although he didn’t give in to Brienne’s pleas to hire a private tutor or send her to boarding school on the Westeros mainland.</p>
<p>When Brienne returned to school, an arrangement had been made.  She was allowed to sit at the back of all the classrooms and leave class two minutes early.  She ate her lunches in the librarian’s office.  She stuck to the walls and did her best to avoid everyone.  She kept her head down and spoke to no one, not even Mr. Baratheon.  She counted the days until weekends, until holidays, until summer when school would be out and she would be free.  She dreaded knowing that summer would be only three short months, and then she’d have to go back.</p>
<p>She could have borne this if she’d at least been able to escape to her dreams, as she had in the past.  But starting that day, Brienne stopped dreaming, at least of anything she could remember in the morning.  It was this, more than anything that had been said to her in the hallway, that made her stop believing she had a soulmate.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>~*~*~*~*~*</p>
</div>The average age for girls to get their soulmarks was fifteen.  For boys, it was closer to seventeen.  There were the outliers, of course, who got their soulmarks early or late, but for the most part, people got them at around the time they should.<p>Occasionally, but not often, a person didn’t get a soulmark at all.  It was generally accepted that if one did not have a soulmark by the time they turned twenty-one, the gods must have a good reason.  These people usually became septas or septons with the belief that their true soulmates were the gods themselves, although the more cynical among those who did not get soulmarks said that always seemed a bit convenient.</p>
<p>In the months leading up to their sophomore year of high school, everyone in Brienne’s class speculated on who would be the first among them to get their soulmark.  Most people believed it was going to be Sansa Stark, and really, she would’ve been the perfect choice.  Tall, willowy, dreamy-eyed…there was no doubt she had a soulmate out there.  Some people thought it would be Daenerys Targaryen, who was unworldly beautiful.  Some thought it would be one of the boys—if Sam Tarly’s soulmate wasn’t Gilly Craster, who was two years older than him and whose soulmark was a bow and arrow when the Tarly coat of arms had an archer on it—the entire school would collapse in shock, so obviously it had to be him.</p>
<p>No one would ever have predicted that it would be Brienne Tarth.  Not even Brienne.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>~*~*~*~*~*</p>
</div><i>The torches along the walls flickered, providing dim light through the steam of the hot baths.  Brienne was grateful both for the lack of light and the abundance of heat as she scrubbed layer after layer of dirt from her skin.  She felt like she might never be clean again after everything she had endured, but this was a start.</i><p>
  <i>She was about to start washing her hair when she heard faint footsteps on the stairs leading down to the baths.  She paused.  Although Roose Bolton had been courteous enough when they had first arrived and had insisted she be treated well, she had seen the thwarted fury in Vargo Hoat’s eyes.  It did not bode well for her if the man caught her alone.  Despite the heat, Brienne shivered.  She glanced over at the maid that had accompanied her here, thinking of how little help she would be if it were the Goat.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>Her senses heightened as the footsteps grew louder.  Then, just as Brienne wished she had a sword—oh, what wouldn’t she give to have a sword—two figures appeared.  Her eyes widened as she recognized Kingslayer.  He stopped in the doorway and allowed the other person—a manservant—to undress him.  Then, calm as he pleased, he sent the servant and the maid off and headed her way, naked as his nameday and completely unashamed.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>When he started to climb into the tub, she said pointedly, “There are other tubs.”</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“This one suits me well enough,” he said, slowly sitting down until he was mostly submerged, keeping his bandaged stump out of the water. </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>Brienne tried to make herself smaller—an impossible task for her.  Kingslayer noticed, of course, and mocked her efforts, as though the only reason she might try to cover herself from his eyes was because she thought he might start thinking of her in…in that way.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“If I faint, pull me out.  No Lannister has ever drowned in his bath and I don’t mean to be the first.”</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“Why should I care how you die?” she asked.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“You swore a solemn vow to get me back to King’s Landing,” he said.  His voice turned scathing as he continued, “Not doing so well so far.  No wonder Renly died with you—"</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>This was too much to bear.  She rose from the water and climbed out of the tub, wanting nothing more than to get away from this terrible man.  She reached for a towel and wrapped it around her.  She turned back and glared at him.  She was about to say something until she saw the stunned look on his face.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“What?” she asked. </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“You have a soulmark,” he said.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i> Brienne clutched the towel tighter around her chest, although that was not where her soulmark was.  “Yes.”</i>
</p>
<p>“You <i>have a soulmark.”</i></p>
<p>
  <i>“Don’t you mock me,” she said in a low voice, blinking several times to keep tears at bay.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“I’m not mocking,” he said.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“Of course you are.  If anyone else knew about it, they would mock because somewhere out there is a man who has no idea what the gods have chosen for him.”  Brienne remembered the morning she’d awakened and found the mark on her right hipbone five years ago.  She had been shocked, then overjoyed, and finally terrified as she realized the implications.  She had told no one about the mark, and as no one had seen her without clothes, it had remained her secret until now.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“I would never mock a person’s soulmark.” </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“Why not?  You’ve mocked everything else about me.  Why not my soulmark?”</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“They say that soulmarks are only given to those judged worthy by the gods.  I always thought…” He closed his eyes and added wearily, “I always thought I would get one, and I never did.” </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“I suppose the gods decided killing your anointed king was not worthy,” Brienne said, securing the towel over her small breasts.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>Kingslayer’s eyes opened slowly, and she saw the anger in them.  “I suppose the gods would have thought it more worthy for me to stand by and watch thousands upon thousands of innocent people die rather than prevent that from happening.  Yes, I suppose that was the better thing to do.”</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>Brienne frowned.  “What…what do you mean?”</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>It was as though by asking the question she had unleashed something within him, as he began talking and couldn’t seem to stop.  He told her about wildfire caches all over King’s Landing, and how he had had to stand by and listen as the Mad King made his plans.  He told her about the day that he knew the city was lost, and how Aerys swore he would leave King’s Landing a city of ashes for Robert Baratheon.   And he told her how he had had no choice but to do what he did.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>What he did not tell her, but what Brienne heard anyway, was his despair and helplessness until the day he had killed Aerys.  And she heard the bitterness at being judged, by the gods and men, for what he saw as his finest act.  When he finished talking and stood up, blood drained from his face as though telling her about it had lanced a painful sore within, but then she realized that he was about to faint.  She hurried forward, ignoring the fact that her towel fell away and left her naked as she caught him in her arms.</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“Guards!” she cried out.  “Bring help!  The Kingslayer!”</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>And faintly, very faintly, she heard him say, “Jaime.  My name is Jaime.”</i>
</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>~*~*~*~*~*</p>
</div>Brienne woke up on her first day of sophomore year to a not-unpleasant tingling in her left wrist and the lingering memory of her dream on her mind as she opened her eyes.  As she realized what had happened, that she had remembered her dream for the first time in three years, she smiled.<p>In the time since her last memory of Kingslayer, a lot had changed.  Selwyn had found a new job and moved them to King’s Landing right before Brienne was to start high school.  Even though she’d been thrilled that she wouldn’t have to deal with all the jerks at her old school anymore, she worried about what would happen to her in a newer, bigger school.</p>
<p>She tried her best not to attract anyone’s notice, but she managed to make a couple of friends.  She was grateful for them, of course, but the absence of her dreams had left her feeling lonely.  Kingslayer had been her only companion during some of the darker moments of her young life. Even if he seemed to exist only to mock her, he’d been there until he hadn’t been.</p>
<p>Now Kingslayer was back.  <i>No,</i> she thought.  <i>Not Kingslayer.  Not anymore.  His name is Jaime.</i></p>
<p>Brienne wondered if Jaime was his name in this lifetime.  She knew sometimes people’s names were different when they met again, but the variations were minor.  Perhaps his name was Jaison or Jaehaerys.  Something told her, however, that Jaime was his name.  In her dreams, he mostly called her wench, but there were times when he called her Brienne.  Everyone else she encountered in her dreams called her Brienne as well, so why wouldn’t he still be Jaime?</p>
<p>There was a tap at her door.  “Sweetling?  It’s time to get up,” her father said.</p>
<p>“I’m awake, I’m awake.”  She rolled out of bed and scratched at her left wrist.  She glanced over at it and gasped.</p>
<p>She hadn’t gotten much opportunity to see her soulmark in her dreams, given where it had been placed before.  She hadn’t dreamed of the day she’d discovered it, although she knew it had happened around this age last time.  Now that it had appeared, and in a much easier place for her to be able to examine it, she couldn’t take her eyes off it.</p>
<p>Her soulmark, appropriately enough for her previous self, was a golden sword with a blue hilt.  It wasn’t obscenely large, maybe only two or three inches in length.  She ran a cautious fingertip along the mark, her vision blurring as tears filled her eyes.  It was real.  Her dreams were real.  She had a soulmate out there somewhere, and his name was Jaime.</p>
<p>Except…</p>
<p>With a sinking heart, she remembered what had prompted Jaime to tell her about killing the Mad King.</p>
<p>
  <i>He didn’t have a soulmark.</i>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter Two</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>“You think I’m crazy, don’t you,” Brienne said flatly.</p><p>“No, I don’t.”  Sansa paused.  “But you said that he didn’t have a soulmark.  I’ve never heard of that happening.”</p><p>Brienne nodded.  “He told me that after he saw mine.”  Brienne ran her hand through her lank hair.  “Sometimes I think I am crazy.  I’ve been dreaming of this guy my whole life only to find out that he wasn’t my soulmate in our former life together?”</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>In the week that followed the appearance of her soulmark, Brienne did everything she could to hide it.  She wore a long-sleeved shirt on the first day of school in spite of the heat, but when the inevitable topic of soulmates and soulmarks came up, she blushed so much that her friend Sansa threatened to tear the sleeves off her shirt to cool her down.  The next day she wore a large Band-Aid on her wrist then nearly freaked out when it came loose during gym class.  She finally settled on wearing a wrist wrap.  Even then, she knew she couldn’t wear it forever.  Her father noticed it and asked if he needed to take her to see a maester.</p><p>By the end of the week, Brienne knew she had to tell someone, so she went to Sansa’s house.  Usually when Brienne went to Sansa’s, she hung out with all Sansa’s siblings for a while.  However, Sansa took one look at her and dragged her upstairs to her bedroom before the rest of the Stark pack could descend on them.</p><p>Once they were alone, Brienne took off the wrap and turned her wrist so Sansa could see.</p><p><i>“Oh my gods!”</i> Sansa shrieked.  “Is that…”</p><p>“Shhhh,” Brienne hissed at the same time Sansa’s mother called up to them, “Sansa?  Is everything all right?”</p><p>“Yes, Mom, everything’s great,” Sansa said.</p><p>“Sorry, Mrs. Stark,” Brienne said.  “We’ll keep it down, promise.”</p><p>The girls waited a minute until they were certain that Mrs. Stark wasn’t going to come up and check on them.  Then Sansa clutched at Brienne’s left arm and pulled her over to sit on the edge of the bed so she could take a closer look.  “It’s so pretty!”</p><p>“Um…thanks, I guess?”</p><p>“You are <i>so lucky</i> to be the first.  Now you don’t have to worry about whether or not you’ll get one at all.”  Sansa touched her fingers to it, then glanced up.  “Did it hurt when you got it?”</p><p>Brienne shook her head.  “Just some tingling.  If it hadn’t been on my wrist, I might not have realized it was there.”</p><p>“What do you think it means?”</p><p>“What do you mean?”</p><p>“Well, you know how they say that soulmarks have a specific meaning to the people who have them.  Like, my parents’ soulmark is a fish leaping over a wolf, because those were the animals on our ancestors’ house sigils.  My aunt Lyanna’s was a tower, and she met her soulmate at Targaryen Towers in King’s Landing.  With yours being a sword, maybe you’ll meet your soulmate because of your interest in the War of the Five Kings.”</p><p>Brienne bit her lower lip.  “Sansa, if I tell you something, will you promise not to tell anyone?”</p><p>Sansa nodded.</p><p>“I mean it, not even Margaery.”</p><p>Sansa held up her pinky.  “Pinky swear.”</p><p>Brienne linked her pinky around Sansa’s for a few seconds, took a deep breath, and told Sansa about her dreams.  She didn’t talk about what had happened at her old school, or about not having any dreams for three years, but she did tell her about the rest of it, including her dream that morning.</p><p>Sansa didn’t say anything for a minute, lost in thought.</p><p>“You think I’m crazy, don’t you,” Brienne said flatly.</p><p>“No, I don’t.”  Sansa paused.  “But you said that he didn’t have a soulmark.  I’ve never heard of that happening.”</p><p>Brienne nodded.  “He told me that after he saw mine.”  Brienne ran her hand through her lank hair.  “Sometimes I think I <i>am</i> crazy.  I’ve been dreaming of this guy my whole life only to find out that he wasn’t my soulmate in our former life together?”</p><p>Sansa stood up and paced.  “Maybe…” She paused, then continued pacing.  “Maybe you actually <i>do</i> have a little greensight.”</p><p>“Not possible.  I’m not descended—”</p><p>“Yeah, yeah, your family tree and all, but I’ll bet you do have an ancestor somewhere who was descended from the First Men and it just wasn’t documented.  We all do.”  She muttered under her breath, “Some of us more than others.”</p><p>“But if I had greensight, why would I be dreaming of my future soulmate in a past life which we didn’t share?”</p><p>“Experts don’t know how it works.  Not even greenseers themselves can explain how it works.  Hells, half the time they can’t even explain what their dreams mean, then when the event occurs, they’re like, ‘oh yeah, here’s how my dream predicted that was going to happen.’  Pffft.”</p><p>Brienne sighed.  “So I could be having dreams of a former life I lived with my soulmate, or it could be that I’m…I don’t know.  Projecting him into my dreams even though we’ve never met?  I guess that would explain why he’s so handsome.  But why would I do that even when I was a kid?”</p><p>Sansa shrugged.  “Nothing about soulmates makes sense, really.  They just <i>are,</i> and we have to trust the gods to make the right choice for us.”</p><p>“But what if my soulmate is someone who, I don’t know, flays people or tortures cats?  When you meet them, are you supposed to go, ‘oh, that’s okay, no problem, the gods chose you for me so I love you anyway?’  I don’t think so.”</p><p>“People who do those things don’t get soulmarks,” Sansa said.  “Every study on sociopaths has documented that they don’t have them.  You have a point, though.  Who are the gods to say that we can’t figure out on our own who we should be with?”</p><p>“Exactly.  If I meet this man on the street, would he pass me by or would there be something that drew him to me?  If looks like he does in my dreams, would I even think I stood a chance with him?”</p><p>Sansa sat on the bed and put an arm around Brienne.  “And here I thought the worry was just going to be whether we’d get soulmarks or not.”</p><p>“Tip of the iceberg,” Brienne mumbled. </p><p>“I guess one way to know whether or not he’s real is to ask yourself if you’ve ever seen someone you know in this life in your dreams, like your father or Margaery or me.”</p><p>Brienne stiffened, thinking of Mr. Baratheon, and Ron Connington, and the journal she’d burned as soon as she’d gotten home that day.  Then she thought of a dream she’d had recently that had freaked her out so much that she hadn’t wanted to write it down, although she had done so anyway.</p><p>“Actually…” Brienne hesitated.  It was one thing to tell your friend you had unusual dreams, but quite another to tell her she had been in one of them.  “I had a dream where I kind of…rescued you from someone who looked like your mom’s friend, Mr. Baelish.”</p><p>Sansa’s nose crinkled.  “Ugh!  He’s so slimy.  What was I doing with him?  He wasn’t my soulmate, was he?”</p><p>“I don’t know, but I doubt it.  That’s the thing—unless I’m directly involved with what’s going on, I don’t know all the circumstances.  Like how I didn’t know all the details about how Jaime came to be called ‘Kingslayer’ until he told me.  I didn’t even know his <i>name</i> until he told me in the dream.  It’s frustrating.”</p><p>“Well, if you’re having green dreams, I’m definitely staying away from that sleaze so you won’t have to rescue me from him.”  Sansa stood up.  “I think you shouldn’t cover your soulmark up anymore.  Go to school on Monday and let everyone see it.  People are going to talk, because people are jerks.  If they make fun of you, we’ll have Robb and Jon kick their asses.”</p><p>“We’re not doing that,” Brienne said.  “Your parents would have a conniption if they did.”</p><p>“Which means Mom will tell Dad to punish them, so Dad will make them clean out the garage and after they’re done, he’ll wink and tell them they did the honorable thing standing up for their friend, only next time don’t get caught,” Sansa said with a laugh.  “Before long, someone else will get their soulmark, then another, and before you know it, people won’t care that you have one anymore.”</p><p>Sansa was right, of course.  There were those who made comments about it, but those were mostly neutralized by her friends.  A rumor started that Brienne had gotten a tattoo and was passing it off as a soulmark, but that only led some of the guys to ask her where she’d gotten it done because of how good it looked.  They were easy to brush aside.  She only saw Robb and Jon with bruised knuckles once, although they both denied it had anything to do with her.</p><p>Two weeks after the revelation that Brienne had been the first to get her soulmark, Sam Tarly got the expected bow and arrow on his right forearm.  He timidly went up to Gilly Craster to show her.  Her delighted smile, followed by the sight of the two of them walking around school arm in arm for the rest of the day, melted hearts everywhere and took the attention off of Brienne.</p><p>Over the next few months, more of their classmates got their soulmarks.  Sansa got a direwolf on her left shoulder blade.  Jeyne Poole got some sort of strange-looking creature no one could identify on her right thigh, which made her cry and refuse to participate in gym class because she was required to wear shorts.  There was a rumor that Gendry Waters got a soulmark of a silver needle on the bottom of his right foot, but since he always wore shoes and refused to answer the question when asked, no one knew for sure.</p><p>And so life went on.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>~*~*~*~*~*</p>
</div><i>Brienne and Jaime stood and watched as the mass of the undead creatures approached.  They were still some distance off, but they could see them.  They knew that the final battle had come.</i><p>
  <i>They were holding swords that Jaime told her had been forged from a great Valyrian steel broadsword, as if that fact alone would save them.  He called them magical swords that could do more damage than the dragonglass most others held, at least that was what Jon Snow had said when he’d heard they both had Valyrian steel.  Jaime was a good liar.  Sometimes when you had so little hope left, a good lie could give you the courage and strength to do what needed to be done.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“We’re going to make it, Brienne,” he swore as the dead came closer.  “We’re going to live.  And when this is all over, you’re going to take me to Tarth.  I’ve always wanted to walk the beaches and see the mountains with all the sheep.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“Sheep?  We don’t raise sheep on Tarth.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“Oh?  My mistake.  You must raise goats then.  It would explain so much about you.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Brienne shoved the middle of his armor-covered chest, which made him laugh.  But he grew serious again.  “Promise me that if something happens, if one of those creatures gets me and I turn, promise me that you’ll do what needs to be done to save me.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Brienne blinked back tears as she realized what he was asking her to do.  “I can’t do it.  Please don’t make me be the one.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“You can.  You have to do it.  And I’ll do the same for you.”  He reached out to touch her instinctively with his right hand—his gold hand—and cursed.  She grasped the hand as he tried to draw it back and held it.  “I swear on Widow’s Wail that I will never let them have you, no matter what it takes.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>The tears fell and instantly froze on her face.  “I swear on Oathkeeper,” she whispered.  “No matter what it takes.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Suddenly, before she knew what he was doing, Jaime leaned in and kissed her.  It was surprisingly gentle, not what she would have expected at all.  She wasn’t sure what she should do, but before she could do anything, he pulled away, his eyes gleaming in the darkness.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“Jaime, I—”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>But what she was about to say was lost as a loud roar went up, and the dead were upon them.</i>
</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>~*~*~*~*~*</p>
</div>Most people met their soulmates by the time they were twenty-five.  As with the appearance of soulmarks, there were outliers who didn’t meet theirs until much later.  The oldest couple on record were eighty years old when they met.  They married six weeks later and lived happily for ten years before dying within hours of each other.<p>In the years after her soulmark first appeared, Brienne watched as the people around her found their soulmates and paired off.  Sansa met her soulmate, Sandor Clegane, on her twentieth nameday when a bunch of them went bar hopping.  Sandor was at the last bar of the night, and when he’d removed his leather jacket to play a game of pool with a drunken, foolish Robb, they’d seen the direwolf mark on his shoulder, same as Sansa’s. Not who anyone was expecting her soulmate to be, and yet the moment they’d met, it seemed to make sense.  The two had married a year later and still acted like newlyweds.</p><p>It turned out that Gendry Waters did indeed have a needle soulmark on the bottom of his right foot.  So did Sansa’s little sister, Arya, who didn’t get hers until her seventeenth nameday.  Her little brother Rickon spotted it when he was tickling her feet to wake her up.  Arya came tearing down the stairs, screaming, “I’m not marrying <i>anybody,</i> I don’t care what the gods want!”  Once Sansa saw the mark, she remembered the rumors about Gendry and told Arya.  Arya didn’t budge on her “never marrying anybody” stance, but as Gendry had as little interest in marriage as she did, that suited him fine.  The two of them set out to explore the world on Arya’s twenty-second nameday and only came home for holidays and special occasions.</p><p>Margaery didn’t get a soulmark, which suited her even better.  “Why be happy to be tied down to one person when there are so many people out there?” she asked cheerfully whenever someone heard she didn’t have one and gave her pitying looks.  “It’s not like it would keep me from marrying if I wanted a husband.”  Which she <i>didn’t,</i> at least not now.</p><p>As Brienne’s twenty-fifth nameday approached, her hopes that her soulmate would appear dimmed.  He was out there, she knew it, but for reasons known only to themselves, the gods had decided not to let them meet.  The more she thought on it, she wondered if maybe she was having green dreams—that Jaime was out there but she was never going to meet him in this life, for whatever reason.</p><p>Sansa, gods love her, had tried her best to help out.  She’d encouraged Brienne to join dating websites for people searching for their soulmates.  She’d even introduced her to a couple of guys she knew or heard about named Jaime, but after the second one had taken a look at Brienne and fled, Brienne asked her to stop trying.  Besides, Brienne pointed out, neither of them had her soulmark.</p><p>“Neither did Jaime in your dreams,” Sansa said, “but you loved him anyway.  Maybe the gods are telling you that you don’t need to have a mark to have a soulmate.”</p><p>“Then why give me the thrice-damned mark?” Brienne asked, a question for which Sansa had no answer.</p><p>Margaery decided to lessen the sting of Brienne’s soulmate not showing up by throwing her a huge bash for her twenty-fifth nameday.  She invited tons of people from just about every walk of life, making sure that there were plenty of singles over the age of twenty-five in the hopes that Brienne would bust out of her shell.  There were even a few who, like Brienne, had a soulmark without a soulmate, so she wouldn’t feel like the only one.</p><p>Brienne would have liked nothing more than a quiet dinner with friends and an evening spent in front of her computer, looking up places that swore they could remove an unwanted soulmark like one would a tattoo.  She settled for getting drunk, trying not to become too maudlin, and passing out in the penthouse suite of the Highgarden Hotel, where the party had been held.</p><p>The next morning, over brunch served in her hotel room with Sansa, Sandor, and Margaery, Brienne announced that she was done with soulmates. </p><p>“He probably saw me somewhere, saw my soulmark, and ran to the farthest reaches of the North to live with wildlings,” Brienne said, averting her eyes as Sansa tried her best to keep her husband’s hands from getting too frisky.</p><p>“Oh, don’t be silly, Brienne,” Sansa said, playfully swatting Sandor’s hand away from her hip.  “It happens sometimes, but it will happen for you.  The gods gave you your soulmark early for a reason.”</p><p>“Yeah, to make me a cautionary tale for the rest of the ugly girls out there.”</p><p>“Hey.”  Sandor pointed to the heavily scarred half of his face.  “This didn’t exactly make me think anyone was ever going to be my soulmate, but I managed.”  He pointed to the other, unscarred side.  “And this wasn’t exactly pretty to begin with, either.”</p><p>Brienne didn’t want to get into how things were different because he was a man and she a woman, but from the look on Sansa’s face, she knew what Brienne was thinking.</p><p>“Maybe I should check The Registry,” she said quietly, referring to the internet database where families posted a deceased member’s soulmarks so that their soulmate would know what happened.  “If he was out there and now he’s gone, at least I’ll know for sure.”  Sansa and Margaery exchanged a guilty look.  Brienne groaned, knowing what they’d done.  “He’s not on there, is he?”</p><p>Sansa shook her head.  “I don’t know whether to say I’m glad or I’m sorry he’s not on there.”</p><p>“Better he not be there,” Brienne said gloomily.  “At least that means he’s alive, and there’s a chance we might meet one day on my deathbed.”</p><p>“That’s the spirit.  And in the meantime, live it up and have fun, I say,” Margaery raised her mimosa and took a healthy drink.  “There were about a hundred guys here last night.  Surely someone caught your notice?”</p><p>Brienne didn’t want to admit that a small part of her had hoped her soulmate would suddenly appear out of nowhere, spot her at once, and carry her away like in some kind of ridiculous fairy tale.  The problem with knowing what your soulmate looked like—if he was her soulmate—was that she didn’t bother looking at anyone else.  She shrugged.</p><p>“For the seven’s sake, Brienne, some of the most amazing men in Westeros were here last night,” Margaery said, exasperated.  “About the only person who didn’t show up was Tyrion Lannister.”  She set her glass down, looking puzzled.  “Which is strange, because usually if there’s a party with a lot of alcohol and pretty girls, Tyrion will be there.  Wonder what kept him from this one?”</p><p>“Why in the seven hells would you invite Tyrion Lannister?” Sandor asked.  “He’s hardly going to be…”</p><p>“Because Tyrion is one of the smartest people I know in addition to being one of the funniest,” When the others just stared at her, she added, “Fine.  I was hoping that he’d bring his older brother to the party.  He’s mysterious and from what I hear, he doesn’t have a soulmark and he’s sexy as all hells.  But that doesn’t mean I didn’t want Tyrion here!”</p><p>Brienne chuckled.  She wondered how many of Margaery’s reasons for throwing her the nameday party were because she wanted to make Brienne feel better and how many were to try and find herself a new boyfriend.</p><p>Brienne’s musings were interrupted by a swooshing sound coming from her phone.  Text message.  She got up and walked over to the table where she’d stuck it on a charger this morning, looked at who the text was from, and groaned.</p><p>“What?” Sansa asked.  “Who is it?”</p><p>“Dr. Tarly,” Brienne replied.  She read the text.  “He wants to know why I haven’t started the research on the weaponry used during the Long Night.  He says he expects to see something on his desk by the end of the day.”</p><p>“He <i>does</i> remember that you asked for today off, right?” Sansa sounded as pissed off as she got.  “He approved it and everything?”</p><p>“Yeah,” Brienne said with a heavy sigh, because it would do no good to remind him of this.  Her head was pounding enough already, and now she would have to sit in front of her computer for the rest of the day, searching out preliminary resources for Dr. Tarly’s latest project.  She unplugged her phone and wondered where she’d left her purse.</p><p>“No,” Margaery said.  “Uh-uh.  He gave you the day off, so text him and then turn off your phone and enjoy your day.”</p><p>“And lose my job tomorrow.”</p><p>“You don’t exactly need the job,” Sandor said gruffly.  “Didn’t you inherit a bundle four years ago?”</p><p>Brienne had, but she didn’t like thinking about it since it had been from her mother’s estate.  Her friends all thought she was crazy, but she preferred getting by as much as she could on her salary.  If she sat at home all day and didn’t work, she’d go crazy fast.</p><p>“I need to get going, anyway,” Brienne said, finding her purse under the bar.  “You guys, it was great.  Thanks for everything.”</p><p>It took Brienne a little longer to get untangled from her friends, but she was soon heading home.  She should’ve had her mind on where she would start looking for information, but she felt like she was on autopilot, unable to think of anything except getting to her destination.</p><p>She reached her modest townhouse fifteen minutes after leaving the opulent penthouse suite.  Walking into her place, the first thing that caught her eye was the bookshelf.  Her father had had the bookshelf made when she moved here three years ago after graduating from college.  The sturdy, beautiful wood was driftwood from Tarth’s beaches and would last for a lifetime, if not more.  She’d crammed the shelves full of books, ranging from childhood favorites to her current historical interests.</p><p>And there, on the second shelf, sat her journals.  The journals she’d been keeping all these years.  They were all there but one, in the order in which she’d written in them.  She thought of the hours and hours she’d spent writing down all of her memories.  Why had she done it?  Had it been to convince herself that she wasn’t crazy?  Had she planned on showing her soulmate as some sort of offering that she was truly the one for him?</p><p>
  <i>What was the point?</i>
</p><p>Brienne got a garbage bag from her small kitchen and headed for the shelf.  She grabbed a handful of journals and stuffed them into the bag, tears running down her face.  There had been no point.  The gods had found fit to make a joke of her.  Ron Connington had been right all those years ago.  There was no one out there waiting for her, and she had to accept it.</p><p>She got another handful of journals, but as she went to stick them into the bag with the others, one fell from her grasp to the floor and opened to a random page.  Brienne stuck the ones she had in the bag and picked up the fallen book.</p><p>
  <i>Last night, we were back in the Riverlands.  I was in a boat with him and poor Cleos, and we were being chased by Stark men…</i>
</p><p>Brienne flipped a few pages past that.</p><p>
  <i>…horrible dream last night.  It was some time after they cut off Jaime’s hand.  We could hear them coming for me, three of them talking about what they’d do to me.  Jaime tried to convince me to “go away inside,” whatever that means.  When I made it clear I wasn’t going to do it, he managed to catch Vargo Hoat’s attention by yelling “sapphires” at the top of his lungs.  He was successful, but his howl of pain when they kicked him in the stump…I felt sick.  But they left me alone.  At least that night…</i>
</p><p>Brienne flipped to the back of the journal.</p><p>
  <i>… Sometimes I wonder about the randomness of my dreams.  If this were a story, I’d have serious timeline issues with the author, that’s all I can say, because trying to piece the entire thing together has proven impossible.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Last night, I dreamed of a melee…</i>
</p><p>Brienne set it aside and pulled another journal out of the bag, one of her earliest books.</p><p>
  <i>…I wish Kingslayer would quit being so mean to me.  Today we were at a pond and he was offering to help me take a bath, but he wasn’t nice about it.  He keeps making fun of my face and how I don’t have any boobs and says I wish I could be a boy.  I don’t want to be a boy.  Boys are jerks—especially HIM.</i>
</p><p>Brienne chuckled.  Twenty-five-year-old Brienne could see what her ten-year-old self had not—that Jaime had found her fascinating, even if he hadn’t liked her.  She set that journal aside and dug up another one.</p><p>
  <i>…I don’t remember ever having a dream before where I was this young.  I’m living on Tarth with Dad and Nanny Roelle (ugh, why do certain people have to follow you from one life to the next?), and in this dream, I was caught sword fighting with one of the boys training with Ser Goodwin.  Nanny Roelle was furious, but she didn’t say anything while Dad was there.  Dad just got that look in his eye like he does now when I’m doing something he shouldn’t approve of, said for me to go ahead and get on with it, then left.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Of course, that didn’t stop Nanny Roelle—who was a septa in a former life, no wonder I don’t care that much for religion—from taking it out on me later…</i>
</p><p>Brienne read her way through one journal, then another and another.  She only realized how long she’d been at it when her phone rang, glanced up, and saw that it was almost one-thirty.  With a groan, she knew who the caller had to be.  She had sent him a text saying she would get started and keep him updated on her progress.  With Dr. Tarly, that meant hourly updates.</p><p>She was amazed he’d waited this long to call her.</p><p>As she got up and stretched, Brienne’s stomach let out a growl.  She let Dr. Tarly go to voicemail—seven hells to pay tomorrow, but so be it—and went to her small kitchen to make lunch.  She fixed a sandwich with turkey leftover from dinner at the Starks’ house a couple of days earlier.  A handful of potato chips and a banana completed her meal.  She took it to her couch, grabbed another journal from the bag, and resumed reading. </p><p>Two hours later, when her phone began ringing and wouldn’t stop, Brienne put it in silent mode.  An idea was growing in her mind.  Maybe she was crazy, but…</p><p>She kept reading. </p><p>Four hours later, there was a loud knock on her door.  Brienne set the journal she was reading aside and answered it.  To her shock, it was a member of the Gold Cloaks, who had been sent by her fellow research assistant, Hyle Hunt, when Dr. Tarly had gone on a rampage because she wasn’t answering him.  Brienne apologized profusely for their trouble, assured them she would touch base with someone so they knew she was fine, and closed the door on them.</p><p>She sent her text message to Dr. Tarly.  She apologized for not responding and explained that she’d been so engrossed in research that she’d lost track of time.  <i>It’s not entirely a lie,</i> she thought to herself.  He texted back that he wanted to know what she was working on.</p><p><i>Will explain in the morning,</i> she responded.</p><p>His response was a terse <i>you better,</i> but at least he was now off her case for the rest of the day.</p><p>Brienne went back to her journal, which actually did have to do with the Long Night.</p><p>At one in the morning, her eyes were blurry from all the reading she’d done, but she was so full of excitement that she hardly noticed.</p><p>She’d written in those journals all those years but had never gone back and reread them.  Now that she had, what she saw was an amazing story.  No one would believe it was true, of course, even though there were rumors of a female knight who had been heavily involved in the Long Night.  But perhaps she could put her knowledge of history and her ability to research to good use and see what she could come up with.</p><p>Brienne turned on her laptop and began making notes.  In the back of her mind, she acknowledged that she was going to have to quit her job with Dr. Tarly, because he always dismissed any notion that women played a significant role in the Long Night in any capacity.  Much though she didn’t like the idea of dipping into her inheritance more than she already did, she knew she was fortunate in that she did have it to fall back on now that she was going to be without any income at all.</p><p>As the sun rose, Brienne got up and stretched again.  Maybe she was crazy, but she really thought she had something with this idea.  Maybe the reason she had a soulmark hadn’t been revealed to her, or maybe her soulmate had died and his family hadn’t yet gotten around to posting anything, but she had this.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Hey, you can find me on Tumblr!  https://writergirl2011.tumblr.com</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter Three</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Five years after the momentous nameday when she gave up on her soulmate, Brienne would describe her life as content.  She no longer needed to rely on her inheritance.  She had a good career.  She had wonderful friends.  If her soulmate never turned up, she would be just fine.</p><p>At least, that was what she told herself.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Brienne honestly wasn’t sure what she’d expected when she’d quit her job with Dr. Tarly to put together the story of her former life.  Her friends had been overjoyed that she was doing something to get over her disappointment, although Margaery, never having been told about Brienne’s dreams, wasn’t sure where she’d gotten the inspiration to write a novel.</p><p>Or a series of novels, as it turned out.</p><p>Brienne wrote the first book, which she called <i>The Blue Girl,</i> in three months, working obsessively, double-checking with research to make sure she wasn’t remembering something wrong.  Her heroine’s name was Brella but everyone called her Blue because of the remarkable color of her eyes, and she was as plain as Brienne herself was, although Brienne changed just enough physical features that people wouldn’t figure out that she was a self-insert.  She tried to get an agent for it without success, and her attempts to approach publishers without an agent got her nowhere.  Brienne began doubting the choice she’d made and wondered if she had any chance of going back to academia when Margaery suggested that she send it to her brother-in-law, who was a junior editor at a small publishing house.</p><p>Brienne blanched at the suggestion.  “I can’t do that,” she said.</p><p>“Why not?  Renly loves all that War of the Five Kings stuff, and he’s always on the lookout for new talent.  He’d love your book.”</p><p>Brienne had never told Margaery about what had happened in junior high, and on the occasions she was over at Margaery’s house, she’d thankfully never run into either Loras or Renly.  She was trying to explain it when Margaery said, “Leave it to me.  I’ll act as your agent, and you won’t even have to pay me fifteen percent.”</p><p>Before Margaery took the book to Renly, Brienne revealed the pseudonym she’d decided to adopt—S.G. Tarth. </p><p>“For my mother and brother.  Selene and Galladon,” Brienne said when she told Margaery.  Brienne felt a small catch in her throat and knew she was doing the right thing.  Most people would think she’d done it because her book had a better chance of selling if her name was gender neutral, but she knew the truth. </p><p>Margaery, who would never understand why anyone would want to hide their identity, shook her head but took the book to Renly with the pseudonym anyway.  He loved it and insisted on meeting the author, which was how Brienne found herself in an extremely embarrassing luncheon with her first crush.  Even though she’d barely spoken to him after the incident in the hallway, she knew he had to have heard about what she’d written.</p><p>To her relief, Renly was very tactful and courteous.  He laughed when she called him Mr. Baratheon and insisted she call him Renly.  His only mention of their shared past was to tell her that he’d always thought she had talent as a writer based on her homework assignments, and that he was glad that his instincts had been right on that matter.</p><p>“Where do you see this going?” he asked after they’d finished the main course and were waiting on dessert.  “Your outline only talked about this book, but we both know there has to be another one.  Blue leaves home and that’s the end of her tale?  No.  What happens next?”</p><p>Brienne hesitated.  She’d written as far as when she’d run away from home to join in the War of the Five Kings, but she’d written it in a way that it could stand alone and not need another book to continue the story.  “Well, I don’t want to give too much away,” she said.</p><p>Renly shook his head.  “And I wouldn’t want you to do that.  I definitely want to be surprised by what happens, but maybe just a general sense of where you want to go with the story.”</p><p>“Okay.  Well, I…uh, I mean, <i>Blue,</i>” she corrected, “joins the war and gets appointed as a member of one of the Kings’ Kingsguard, but things go wrong from there and that’s where her adventures really begin.  She meets up with who she thinks is a villain, but he’ll later turn out not to be as bad as she thought.  She’ll go on a quest that will test her notions of honor, and in the end, she’ll wind up fighting in the Long Night.”</p><p>Brienne hoped Renly didn’t ask her what happened to Blue after that, because she’d never dreamed of what happened to her and Jaime after the Long Night ended.  She hadn’t realized this until she put her memories in chronological order, and she suspected that the reason she’d never dreamed about their lives after the Long Night was because neither of them survived the war.</p><p>She’d even done some research on who had fought in the Long Night to see, as most of the combatants for the living had been identified whether they’d lived or died.  There had been no Brienne of Tarth recorded, and no one by the name of Jaime at all. </p><p>Renly nodded in approval.  “Excellent,” he said, just as the waitress set their desserts in front of them.</p><p>Brienne spent the next few months completing revisions of the book, awaiting the official launch, and then waiting for the reviews.  To her delight, the majority of critics loved her book.  They praised her writing style, her characterization, and even admired the research she’d done into the period.  There were a couple of exceptions, of course—usually people like Dr. Tarly who thought women in that era did nothing more than run the home and have babies.  Brienne found them easy to ignore when she received messages from young women who thanked her for writing such a unique heroine.  Although <i>The Blue Girl</i> did not make any bestsellers’ lists, it did make several “Best Of” lists, which Brienne appreciated more.</p><p>When the second book, <i>The Blue Knight,</i> was published, Brienne expected a similar reaction.  There was admittedly more action in the book, but she thought she handled it well enough and didn’t sacrifice what readers admired about her writing style and the way she characterized people for it.  She did worry that people might be disappointed about not getting to revisit most of the characters they’d come to love because Blue had left home, but she hoped they would come to like the new people she met.</p><p>The book’s first run sold out in a month.  Critics and readers alike were thrilled with Blue’s adventures, had their hearts broken when she grieved Renly’s death, feared for her when she just managed to escape with Lady Catelyn after being accused of his murder…and everyone fell in love with Jaime, who she referred to only by his moniker of Kingslayer. </p><p>This last puzzled Brienne, because at this point in the story, all Blue knew about him was that he’d murdered his king, had done something to Lady Catelyn’s son that had left him crippled, and was long-rumored to have been having an incestuous affair with his twin sister.  Why would anyone <i>like</i> him?</p><p>“Go back and reread every reference you make to him,” Sansa suggested.  “Long before we meet him, we hear the rumors about who he is, what he’s done, how brilliant he is with a sword.  Then we actually meet him, and even though it’s clear that Blue hates his guts, she’s fascinated with him.  Reread the part where she first sees him, and you’ll see what I mean.”</p><p>Brienne reread, and she saw what Sansa meant.</p><p>“Do you think people will figure out where I’m going with them?” she asked Sansa.</p><p>“Probably.  But the old cliché is that getting there is half the fun.”</p><p>As she wrote the third book, <i>The Blue Captive,</i> she tried to be more careful in developing the relationship between Blue and Kingslayer, only to find herself stymied whenever she did.  When she talked to Renly about her problem, he told her to let go of her fear and write the story she was meant to write.  Brienne rolled her eyes but took his advice, and found her problems eased when she did.</p><p>Five years after the momentous nameday when she gave up on her soulmate, Brienne would describe her life as content.  She no longer needed to rely on her inheritance.  She had a good career.  She had wonderful friends.  If her soulmate never turned up, she would be just fine.</p><p>At least, that was what she told herself.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>~*~*~*~*~*</p>
</div><i>The battle was over at long last, and the living had won.  Brienne had no idea what had saved them—had it been the dragons?  Had it been magic?  Had it been Jon Snow, who everyone believed to be the Prince That Was Promised?  Brienne did not care.  All she knew was that one moment, she had been hacking wights and White Walkers to pieces, and the next, they had collapsed and none rose to take their place.</i><p>
  <i>The Great War was over.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>And Jaime was dying.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>He’d taken the wound mere moments before everything ended, stepping between Brienne and the White Walker who had come upon her unawares, taking the blow that would have ended her.  Brienne had screamed and killed the White Walker.  She had bent toward Jaime with the intention of getting him clear of the oncoming wights, but there had not been time before they’d been on them again.  And then they were gone.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Brienne didn’t know where she got the strength to carry him into Winterfell’s Great Hall, but she gently laid him on down on the ground, the cloak someone had given her when she’d walked in a poor cushion for his body.  Her fingers trembled as she removed his armor, revealing blood-soaked clothing and the wound in his left side.  She yelled for help though she knew it would do no good.  Jaime said as much and tried to send Samwell Tarly on to someone else when he came to examine him.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Samwell wisely followed Brienne’s instructions over Jaime’s and confirmed what they knew.  The wound was mortal.  As Jaime began trembling as though cold, Samwell brought another cloak—Brienne tried not to think of where it may have come from—to put over him.  He left Brienne with a small vial of milk of the poppy to ease Jaime’s suffering, then went to attend someone else.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>The Great Hall was rapidly filling with the survivors—the uninjured helping the injured to whatever patch of floor they could find.  She should be among them, helping, but she couldn’t.  Soon, Jaime would be another body to add to whatever funeral pyre they would erect to make sure that if another Long Night ever occurred, the dead who fought valiantly in this one would not rise up again.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>He would suffer that—Jaime, who had slain his own king to prevent a fire beyond imagining and who had had nightmares about fire ever since.  Foolish as it sounded, Brienne would not add the indignity of dying on a floor to what was to come.  Her small room was not far from the Great Hall, but she was not sure that she had the strength to get him there.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“Milady!”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Brienne looked up to find young Podrick making his way toward her.  Thanking all seven gods, she waved him over.  He threw his arms around her, and she held on to him for a good minute.  When she released him, she said, “I need you to help me move him to my room.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Podrick’s eyebrows shot up.  “But…but that would be…”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>A strangled snort came from the ground.  “I am hardly in a position to dishonor your lady,” Jaime said, managing to smile despite the pain.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Podrick still looked scandalized, but he did as she asked.  Between the two of them, they managed to get Jaime to her room and place him on her bed.  Brienne busied herself getting the fire going as Podrick removed Jaime’s blood-soaked clothing, placed a bandage on the wound in his side, and covered him up with a fur blanket.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“Podrick,” Brienne said once the fire was blazing.  “Is Lord Tyrion about?”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“He was with the Dragon Queen last I saw him, milady.”  Podrick glanced over at Jaime in the bed.  “Is he…”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Brienne nodded.  “No matter how he feels about Ser Jaime, Lord Tyrion will want to be here.” </i>
</p><p>
  <i>“I’ll see if I can find him.”  Podrick left the room quickly.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>As she approached the bed, she wondered if she had done the wrong thing in bringing Jaime here.  He would soon be gone, and all she would have left were memories of him dying here.  But she could hardly have done anything else.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“Bri—” Jaime started to say.</i>
</p><p>Stay calm.  Do not become hysterical.  Keep calm.  <i>Brienne took a deep breath, then another.  “Don’t try to talk, Jaime.  Just…save your strength.” </i></p><p>
  <i>He laughed, or tried to laugh, but it came out as a gasping sputter.  He managed to get hold of the fur blanket Podrick had draped over him and tried to push it down his body.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“What are you doing?” she asked, reaching for the blanket to tug it back up.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“…Must show…you have to see…please, Brienne.  Please.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Brienne didn’t know what he needed to show her so badly.  The look in his eyes was desperate, as if there was something she had to know.  She took the blanket in her hand and slowly pulled it down.  She stopped when she reached his waist.  She could see fresh blood staining the bandage Podrick had placed over his wound. </i>
</p><p>
  <i>“Is this what you want me to see?  That you’re truly dying?  Sam told me as much.”  Brienne kept him covered from the waist down.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“No…no…” He clenched the blanket in his one hand and tried to pull it away from the right side of his body, but he couldn’t prevent the pained gasp as he jostled his wound.  “Please, Brienne…help me.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Brienne could not figure out what was so urgent that she needed to see it, but as he tried to use his gore-spattered golden hand to pull the blanket further down, she took it from his grasp and carefully lowered it, doing her best to keep his groin covered as his right side was exposed. </i>
</p><p>
  <i>And there, plain as day on his right hipbone, was a mark.  A gold sword with a blue hilt.  His soulmark.</i>
</p><p>Her <i>soulmark.</i></p><p>
  <i>“You…that…that’s not possible,” she whispered.  “That can’t be there.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>He gave her a ghost of a smile.  “And yet it is.”</i>
</p><p><i>“But…but it</i> wasn’t <i>there back when we were…when I…” She blushed fiercely, remembering the times she’d cleaned him up after he’d been sick and soiled himself during the long stretches in the saddle, when he was too weak to do it himself.  And most memorably, the day he’d appeared to her in the bath, naked as his nameday and looking half a god despite his obvious ill health.</i></p><p>
  <i>“I know,” he said.  “It appeared the morning after you left King’s Landing.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“That’s not possible,” she repeated.  “People get their soulmarks when they’re children.  No one gets them after that.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>He raised his hand to her scarred cheek.  “I guess the gods have a good sense of humor, not to reveal to me that I had a soulmate until she was gone.  Until I’d driven her away.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“Sent me to fulfill our vow to Lady Catelyn,” she corrected him, feeling tears well up.  She wanted to scream at the gods for being heartless tricksters, to finally send her a soulmate as he lay dying.  She reached up to grasp his hand, gripping it tightly between her own.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“I didn’t need a mark on my skin to tell me what my heart already knew,” he whispered.  “From the moment we met, there was something about you that called to me.  I tried to deny it, but the longer I spent with you, the more it became clear to me.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“Is that why you sent me away?” she asked.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>He shook his head with a grimace. “Cersei was getting suspicious of the time we were spending together.  We had just lost Joffrey and she wasn’t in her right mind, if she ever was.  I feared what she might do to you.  I had to get you away from her.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“What did she say when she saw the mark?”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“She never saw it.”  Brienne couldn’t hide her disbelief.  Jaime grasped her hand in his good one.  “Brienne…I haven’t lain with Cersei since you left King’s Landing.  I wouldn’t have even if the mark hadn’t appeared, I swear it.  When you left…” He coughed, a dribble of blood coming out of his mouth.  Brienne made a small noise.  “When you left, you took with you my honor…my heart…my soul.  They’re yours, always.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“You can’t leave me, Jaime.  Please.  Please live, for me.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i> “Gods know I wish I could, but at least I die knowing that the war is over, and you are safe.  And I had a hand in making sure of both.”  With what little strength he had left, he squeezed her hand.  “Brienne, I vow that somehow, someday, my soul will find yours.  I don’t care if it takes me a hundred years or a thousand.  We will be together again.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“I’ll be waiting,” she promised.  “No matter how long it takes.”</i>
</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>~*~*~*~*~*</p>
</div>“NO!”<p>Brienne woke from the dream with a gasping sob.  She threw back the covers and ran to where her laptop had been charging on the desk across from her hotel room bed.  Once the computer booted up, she opened a web browser and clicked on the bookmark she’d made five years earlier for The Registry.  With tears in her eyes, she typed, ‘SWORD’ and waited for the page to load that would show her the soulmark.</p><p>There was nothing.  The only swords in the registry were not ones that matched hers.</p><p>Brienne wished she could be relieved by this, but she couldn’t.  The mark wasn’t there right now, but perhaps she’d dreamed of his death in their former life because he’d just died in this one.  His family would need time to deal with other things before adding his mark to The Registry.</p><p>Brienne closed the laptop, tears running down her face.  So now she knew what had happened to Jaime, at least.  He’d died in the Long Night protecting her.  And he’d been her soulmate after all.</p><p>
  <i>Why didn’t you tell me about the soulmark?  Why did you wait until you were dying to show me?  We could’ve been together, we could’ve…</i>
</p><p>Brienne cursed herself for waking when she had.  Maybe if she’d been able to stay asleep a little longer, she would’ve found out the answer to those questions. </p><p>
  <i>“I didn’t need a mark on my skin to tell me what my heart already knew.”</i>
</p><p>Brienne sighed and knew he’d been right.  As Sansa had said, her past self had been fascinated with him even when she’d despised him.  Once he peeled away the layers of cynicism and disillusionment that had become as much a part of him as his armor, she’d fallen in love with him in spite of thinking he didn’t have a soulmark. </p><p>
  <i>My soul will find yours.</i>
</p><p>But it hadn’t, had it?  If this were the case, they should have found each other long before now.  Instead, she’d lived half her life with a mark that no one else had sought to claim.  Maybe that was the whole point of the story.  She was going to love someone, and he wouldn’t have her soulmark, but it wouldn’t matter to either of them.  That happened sometimes, especially for people whose soulmate died early.</p><p>Her cell phone chimed.  Brienne glanced at the little alarm clock on the nightstand and saw that it was almost seven o’clock.  She sighed again.  In three hours, she was due at the largest bookstore in Lannisport for a book signing, and she’d have to do it on less than three hours of sleep.  Served her right for staying up so late writing (and rewriting, and rewriting…) the opening chapter of her next book. </p><p>It was week two of the book tour for <i>The Blue Captive,</i> with another two weeks to go.  Renly told her that the first printing was almost sold out and they were rushing to get more books out to the public.  Brienne was glad to hear it, but she’d be even happier when this was over and she could go home.  She missed her townhouse, her friends, and her little cat, which she’d named Ser Pounce.  Sansa gave her regular updates on all three, but it wasn’t the same.  Brienne enjoyed traveling and meeting with her fans, now that she’d adjusted her mind to the notion of having fans in the first place, but she missed home.</p><p>“Just two weeks to go,” she said aloud as she walked toward the bathroom for a shower.  “Then you’re done for another year.”</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>~*~*~*~*~*</p>
</div>Personal appearances on the tour were mostly the same.  She started by reading a short selection from her book—she’d chosen the opening scene when Blue, Kingslayer, and Kingslayer’s cousin Cleos managed to escape the Stark men who had been ordered to track them down and return them to the camp.  People chuckled when Blue got the inspiration to drop the boulder onto the pursuing boat, worried with her for a moment when it looked like Kingslayer might row away and leave her behind, then applauded as the chapter ended with the trio continuing on.<p>Brienne put the book down and gave them a small smile, waiting for the applause to die out.  She took some questions from the audience.  Rarely did she get a question that she didn’t know how to answer, although occasionally something came up that took her aback and left her scrambling.  But they only asked questions about the book itself and where the series was going.</p><p>After she finished with the questions, she took her place behind a table that had been set up for her and waited as the crowd formed a line to have their copies of the new book signed.  She tried her best to make each person’s experience unique, but there were only so many ways she could put, “thanks for buying my book, hope you enjoy it, keep reading.”</p><p>About halfway through, Brienne felt a tingle along her left wrist.  Her right wrist bugged her at these events because of all the writing she did, and it didn’t flare up until closer to the end.  And the tingling was definitely her left wrist.</p><p>With a small frown, Brienne flexed her hand, willing the prickles to go away so she could focus on getting through today, as the next person in line gently set her newest book on the table before her.  She picked up her pen, slid the book toward her, and opened it to the front page.  Usually, this was where she looked up, polite smile plastered on her face, and asked the buyer a few generic questions before signing.  When asked, she would include an inscription with her autograph.</p><p>Today there was an inscription waiting for her.</p><p>
  <i>I’m sorry I took so long, wench.</i>
</p><p>Brienne froze.</p><p>There were two choices she’d made when she’d decided to write her past life story.  To Renly’s initial frustration, Brienne had decided not to identify Kingslayer by an actual name.  When Renly pressed the issue, she said keeping him nameless would add to the mystery surrounding him, and when people went wild about that fact, he ruefully admitted she’d been right.  The decision Renly didn’t know about—that <i>no one</i> knew about—was that she’d opted not to have Kingslayer call Blue “wench.”  She’d substituted “milady” instead.</p><p>She’d told herself the reason she had made those changes was there were some things about her story that she wanted to keep private.</p><p>She’d been fooling herself the whole time. </p><p>Brienne looked up and met the familiar green eyes of the man who had been in her dreams since she was a young child.  He wasn’t wearing armor but rather Aemoni, and the missing right hand was made of the most up-to-date technology and material instead of gold.  But it was him.  Golden Lion.  Kingslayer.</p><p>“Jaime,” she whispered.</p><p>And as he turned his left arm, she saw the familiar gold sword with the blue hilt on his left wrist.  <i>My soul will find yours.</i></p><p>“Hello, Brienne,” he said, and smiled so brightly that it nearly took her breath away.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And so Brienne's story ends!  Tomorrow I'll post a one-shot that will lead into Jaime's side of the story.</p><p>This story was inspired by this Tumblr prompt, for which I have to thank ddagent, who reblogged it:  <i>You become a writer and your series of novels become extremely popular, but what they don’t know is that you’re retelling your previous life where certain circumstances made it so you and your soulmate did not end up together but your soulmate promises to be with you the next lifetime. At a book signing you open the book cover of a fan’s copy to see something written on the front page: “I’m sorry I took so long.”</i></p><p>I meant it to be a one-shot, but as usual for me, that didn't happen.  ;)</p><p>Thanks for reading, and again, you can find me on Tumblr at https://writergirl2011.tumblr.com</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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